Live Happy Now

If you ever wonder why you think or feel the way you do for seemingly no reason, you’re not alone. And this week’s guest is going to explain how—and why—that happens. Judy Wilkins Smith is a world-renowned speaker, author, and expert in family patterns. In her new book, Decoding Your Emotional Blueprint: A Powerful Guide to Transformation Through Disentangling Multigenerational Patterns, she explains how our DNA is influenced by trauma and emotions and can create patterns that limit us from reaching our full potential. She’s here to tell us how to identify some of those beliefs and patterns and, more importantly, give us the tools to overcome them. In this episode, you’ll learn: How trauma and thought patterns from previous generations could be affecting you. Ways to identify your family patterns and understand systemic sentences. Tools to start rewiring your brain and changing those patterns.

If you’re like most people, you probably have a little bit of extra “stuff” lying around the house. But listening to this episode might just change the way you look at it.  This week, decluttering expert Tracy McCubbin, author of Make Space for Happiness: How to Stop Attracting Clutter and Start Magnetizing the Life You Want, shares some surprising insights about the relationship between clutter and happiness. And she’ll also tell you what straightening up the space in your house can do for the space in your head. In this episode, you'll learn: Why decluttering goes hand-in-hand with positivity. What “clutter blocks” are and how to get rid of them. The benefits of living an uncluttered life.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and that made it the perfect time to sit down with Cathy Fink and Marcy Marxer, best known as the Grammy-winning duo Cathy & Marcy. They have been entertaining audiences for more than 40 years, and when Marcy received a breast cancer diagnosis, they faced it the same way they have faced all of life’s challenges — side by side, with music and humor. The result is the comedic musical All Wigged Out, which has been made into a film and details Marcy’s journey with breast cancer. They sat down with host Paula Felps to talk about how they transformed this health challenge into a musical story of hope and healing to share with the world. In this episode, you'll learn: How they used music to process Marcy’s diagnosis. Why celebrating even small milestones was important to their journey. How they turned the experience into a humorous healing story.

World Kindness Day is just a month away, but there’s no reason not to start observing it now. This week’s guest is Dr. Michelle Robin, founder of Small Changes Big Shifts, the Big Shifts Foundation, and the 31-Day Kindness Campaign. Launched in 2019, the Kindness Campaign is a free inspirational email adventure that begins October 14. When you sign up, you’ll receive a daily email suggesting an act of kindness that you can do that day, and Michelle tells us what to expect from the campaign and explains what kindness can do for your overall well-being.  In this episode, you'll learn: Why kindness is so good for us — and those we share it with. What happens in our brains when we practice kindness every day. How Michelle’s desire to spread kindness grew into a month-long campaign.

October is one of our favorite months at Live Happy, and this week, you’ll find out how to make this a truly Happy Halloween. Host Paula Felps is joined by Live Happy CEO and co-founder Deborah Heisz and e-commerce marketing manager Casey Johnson to talk about our all-new #HalloweenHappyActs campaign. If you’ve been with us for a while, you already know that every March, we encourage well-being with a month of intentional activities that we call #HappyActs. This year, we’re combining #HappyActs with our favorite holiday to create an entire month of happiness while celebrating the spirit of Halloween. In this episode, you’ll learn: What #HappyActs are — and how to practice them. Why Halloween is the perfect time to explore #HappyActs. How to turn #HalloweenHappyActs into a challenge for greater participation.

Fall is a time for turning inward, and this week’s guest, Kassandra Reinhardt, is here to help us learn how to connect with ourselves through yoga. Her newest book, Year of Yoga: Rituals for Every Day and Every Season, helps experienced and novice yogis alike move through the seasons using affirmations and intentions that coincide with the time of year. She’s here to tell us why our practice may change along with the seasons and talk about what affirmations may be particularly helpful as we move into fall. In this episode, you’ll learn: How yoga can help us manage stressful situations Why yoga is not a one-size-fits-all practice. Affirmations to focus on this fall.

This week, host Paula Felps sits down with renowned cinematographer, director and producer Louie Schwartzberg. Louie is best known for the stunning imagery he creates using time-lapse photography; in films like Fantastic Fungi and the 3D IMAX film Mysteries of the Unseen World with National Geographic, he has shown us the beauty of the world in ways we’ve never seen before. With his new film, Gratitude Revealed, he has created an immersive, awe-inspiring experience that takes us inside the human spirit to explore the wonder, beauty and joy of gratitude. In this episode, you’ll learn: How this film was a natural evolution of his work with nature. What he learned about gratitude while creating this film. Why gratitude is so important to him.

The right song lyrics can express exactly what you’re feeling, and they can even help kids open up about what’s happening in their lives. With the Sound It Out campaign, parents and caregivers can support emotional wellness in young people by using songs and lyrics to help kids express their feelings. In this episode, we’re joined by Dr. Regina Miranda, a professor of psychology at Hunter College and one of the advisors for the program, to learn more about it.    In this episode, you’ll learn: What the campaign offers and how it came about. How music supports emotional wellness. How to use the Conversation Starter Pack to talk with kids about their feelings.

As we all settle into our post-summer routine, certain family members can sometimes get overlooked. This week, therapist Brittany Derrenbacher is back to talk about how a change in routine can affect our pets. Brittany is a certified grief and pet loss specialist, founder of the special needs animal rescue Luna Bell’s Moonbows and owner of Sunshine Healing & Empowerment in Louisville, Kentucky, and she explains why our furry family members are so affected by the end-of-summer change in routine and tells us what we can do about it. In this episode, you’ll learn: How pets are affected when we go back to school and back to work. How small changes in your morning routine can make a big difference. What we can do to make being alone less stressful for pets.

We’ve hit the end of summer and for many people, that means dealing with end of summer anxiety. And it’s not just for kids! This week’s guest, Eli Weinstein, is a social work therapist and host of The Dude Therapist podcast, and he’s here to talk about how we all can handle that end of summer anxiety and head into fall with a new game plan for the whole family. In this episode, you’ll learn: What causes end-of-summer anxiety. Why creating a routine helps manage stress. How to find a strategy that works for your family.

As we go back to school, it means kids are spending even more time on their screens. So what’s a parent to do? This week’s guest will tell you! Childcare advocate and author Florence Ann Romano joins us this week to talk about the importance of balancing time on devices. Florence Ann is a big fan of ditching the devices and discovering off-screen play, and she’s here today to talk about how parents can get a handle on their children’s screen time — and maybe even improve their own screen habits. In this episode, you’ll learn: What too much screen time does to developing brains. How to develop learning opportunities without screens. How parents’ screen usage affects their relationship with their children.

Whether we admit it or not, most of us spend a lot of time comparing ourselves to others. But what if our true superpower is learning just to be ourselves? This week, host Paula Felps is joined by Dr. Ronald Siegel, a psychotherapist, Harvard psychology professor and mindfulness expert whose latest research looks at what a climate of self-comparison is doing to undermine our happiness. His new book, The Extraordinary Gift of Being Ordinary: Finding Happiness Right Where You Are, looks at the trap of constant self-evaluation and explains how we can learn to let go of our comparison culture and live a more satisfying, happy life. In this episode, you’ll learn: Why it’s natural for us to compare ourselves to others. How social media has amplified the climate of self-comparison. How practices like gratitude and mindfulness help minimize the effects of constant self-evaluation.

Music has such a powerful healing ability that some researchers are even looking at “sonic pharmacology” — using music as a tool to improve patients’ health. Steve Keller is one of the world’s leading experts on sonic strategy. As a researcher, he has explored how music and sound affect everything from our physical wellbeing to our emotional state to our relationships and overall perception of happiness. In this episode, he looks at the many surprising ways music can be used as a healing tool — and explains why, one day, your doctor might give you a musical prescription. In this episode, you’ll learn: How the medical community is using sound to enhance healing. Some of the surprising ways noise affects our health — and how music can help. The unexpected ways music can change your eating habits and promote a healthier lifestyle.

As kids (and teachers) head back to school, what if they started focusing on subjects like gratitude, kindness and empathy? This week’s guest, Ash Manuel, left his teaching career after discovering positive psychology and set out on a mission to change how children learn. Now, his Growing with Gratitude program is a global positive education program that helps build and protect children’s mental wellbeing.   In this episode, you’ll learn: How Ash became interested in positive psychology. How he has applied his teaching skills to develop the Growing with Gratitude program. What he hopes to accomplish by taking gratitude into classrooms.

This is a special week at Live Happy Now because we’ve reached an important milestone — and we truly could not have done it without you. This week, host Paula Felps sits down with Live Happy CEO and Co-founder Deborah Heisz for an important announcement and to talk about the future of the podcast. In this episode, you’ll learn: What led to the launch of Live Happy Now. How our podcast has changed over the past seven years. What we hope listeners gain from listening each week.

Bullying is a huge issue for kids today, and as we go back to school, many children are dreading having to face that challenge every day. This week’s guest, Jennifer Fraser, PhD, is author of the powerful new book, The Bullied Brain: Heal Your Scars and Restore Your Health. Jennifer is an award-winning educator whose online courses and workshops teach the impact of neuroscience on personal development and culture change. In her latest book, she breaks down how bullying affects our brains and, more importantly, she tells us how to help our brains heal from that trauma. In this episode, you’ll learn: What happens to our brains when they are being bullied. How society has normalized bullying from adults — and why it’s so important to stop that cycle. Steps to take to address bullying in schools and the workplace.

As the world opens up to traveling again, can you make your travel experiences more meaningful? This week’s guest will show you how! Jessica Blotter is a speaker and journalist who specializes in sustainable and regenerative tourism. After witnessing extreme poverty on a vacation to Belize, Jessica launched a movement in 2016 called Kind Traveler, which allows travelers to positively impact the communities they visit — and enjoy incredible experiences as well. In this episode, she explains why it’s so important to travel kindly, and every trip you take can make a difference. In this episode, you’ll learn: What sustainable and regenerative tourism is and why it matters. The role that giving back plays in creating a more positive travel experience. How you can embrace sustainable tourism in your own travels.

Music education typically focuses on teaching students who want to be musicians or music teachers, but this week’s guest sees it as a vehicle for teaching an entire spectrum of social emotional learning skills. Nadine Levitt is a mother, former opera singer and the founder of WURRLYedu, which uses music to teach children about things like empathy, collaboration, impulse control and so much more. In this episode, she explains how music can help change the way young learners look at the world and broaden their understanding of complex emotions. In this episode, you’ll learn: How her career as a performer led Nadine to create Wurrlyedu. How music can help children learn critical life skills. Why using music for social emotional learning is particularly important in our current environment.

Laughter and humor feel good, but have you thought about how much good it can do? This week’s guest, Dr. Shepherd Siegel, is a musician turned educator whose recent research has centered around the idea of play, playfulness and humor as a driving force of change. His latest book, Tricking Power into Performing Acts of Love: How Tricksters through History have Changed the World, looks at the trickster archetype and the role it plays in social change. On this episode, he talks about the importance of finding fun and humor in our lives — and how to reclaim those habits as adults.  In this episode, you’ll learn: Why it’s important to explore fun and playfulness. The importance of discovering humor in dark times. How to get more humor and playfulness in your life.

It’s summertime, and that makes it a great time to get outside and enjoy the sunshine. But this is about more than working on a killer tan; this week, Laura Allen and Courtney Crim from Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, talk about the amazing power of nature. Laura and Courtney developed the course The Natural Environment and Well-being, and on this episode, they explain why it’s so important to get outside every day and what nature is doing for your mind, body and spirit.   In this episode, you’ll learn: The mental, physical and emotional benefits of spending time in nature. Tips for getting more nature in your life — even if you live in an urban area. How much time you should spend outside every week.